Banging Monsters
by frozen-delight
Summary: Horror and shame pulsed through Dean when he remembered that one moment where he'd seen his black eyes in the mirror; underneath all the confusion and terror a warm liquid emotion pooled low in his stomach, something Dean now recognized as relief. [Coda to 10x17 "Inside Man". Sam/Dean]


Unbetaed, so apologies for any mistakes.

Warning for violence, rough sex and heavy angst. This is really not a nice fic.

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**Banging Monsters**

_There's things… people, feelings_,_ that I want to experience differently than I have before. Or maybe even for the first time._

The knock on his door, followed a moment later by Sam stepping into the room came as no surprise to Dean. He'd been expecting Sam to come and bitch at him, annoyance and reluctant amusement at Dean's pranks chasing all traces of his latest failure to find a cure for the Mark off his face.

But the anticipated complaint, _Dude, what the hell did you do to my toothbrush?!_,accompanied by the ghost of a smile underneath his brother's pissed-off frown,never came_._

Instead, Sam approached him with red-rimmed eyes, his bottom lip trembling.

Dean's throat clenched like it did every time he'd failed to give his baby brother the semblance of a normal childhood. Because he couldn't prevent that Sam missed his latest soccer practice. Because he had no answer to Sam's insisted questions of why they didn't have a mom. He wondered why he'd ever thought he could make Sam forget the biblical doom surrounding them with a stripe of tape on his phone.

The last time he'd seen Sam this upset, Dean had just slaughtered a house full of civilians. The time before that, he'd been a demon, taunting and tormenting his brother by every trick in the book. Whatever it was that had broken down Sam's calm and capable façade this time, it couldn't be anything good.

Sam looked at him and gulped.

_Please don't_, Dean thought desperately. _Please don't tell me about your latest failed attempt to get rid of the Mark. I don't want to know, Sammy, I thought I made that clear_.

Every lie Sam had told him before he left had been an implicit _Do you want to talk about it? Do you want to be involved?_, and every lie Dean had answered with had been a clear-cut _No. No. No._ Because he couldn't live like that. Wrapped up in the shroud of Sam's endeavors and expectations. Trapped.

Whether he sensed Dean's unspoken plea or not, Sam didn't say anything. He merely kept moving towards him, his footsteps inaudible, his expression one of silent misery.

Up close, Dean could see the tear tracks on his face. He took in how sallow Sam's skin was, as though he hadn't slept properly in days, and his stomach churned with guilt.

It was another thing they didn't talk about, by mutual agreement, but Dean felt certain that his nightmares had disturbed Sam's sleep more than once. He'd repeatedly been this close to suggesting that Sam move into a different wing of the bunker, but the unwillingness to think about his nightmares, let alone talk about them, had always arrested his tongue. Plus having Sam close-by made him feel safe. Just in case.

Still he winced in sympathy at the sight of Sam's bloodshot, puffy eyes. He saw all of his transgressions reflected back at him, written into every line and shadow of Sam's face. Unthinkable that Sam was only thirty-one. During the past year alone, Dean had worn him out more than Yellow Eyes and Lucifer put together, inflicting a thousand new shades of pain on his brother's brave, tortured soul, more resourceful than anything he'd ever tried during those last ten dark years in Hell, and all the more trenchant for its mostly being unwitting. He might no longer be able to play the part of the clown with any real conviction, but he still had the role of the monster down pat.

Dean shivered uncomfortably.

Then Sam stepped even closer and Dean stopped taking note of anything else. Because Sam was suddenly kissing him, pressing dry, chapped lips against his.

"What the –" Dean exclaimed, pushing away from his brother as soon as his brain kicked back in. His lips tingled with the remnants of Sam's touch and his mind was reeling.

Sam looked a lot more put together than a minute ago. Whatever had shaken him up when he entered Dean's room was now buried behind his stubborn version of calm. He spread out his hands in a soothing gesture, as though approaching a frightened animal. "Cas told me about your confession."

Dean recoiled as if he'd been slapped.

Sam had crossed all sorts of boundaries during the night; no doubt he'd gone and done something stupid. Judging by the defeated slump of his shoulders when he came back probably even Metatron levels of stupid. And as if that weren't enough, now he was deliberately tearing down another boundary altogether.

And he expected Dean to stand there and take it. (_Get on board with it even._)

Well, Sam wasn't going to be the only one to dash expectations today.

Dean backed away, his stomach tied in knots. The revelation that angels who had no concept of privacy could listen in on confessions was bad enough. That Cas had shared what he'd overheard with Sam, probably out of some misguided attempt at making Dean feel better, wasn't a cause for cheer either. But that Sam wanted to talk about it (_and act on it_) – that was by far the worst thing.

Here Dean had been afraid Sam would yet again breach the subject of finding a cure for the Mark. It seemed almost laughable now.

So what if Sam managed to find a way to remove the Mark from Dean's arm. (_And there wasn't one, there wasn't._) There was no cure for the longing that had driven Dean to confession.

"But –" He cringed at how thin his voice sounded. Then he narrowed his eyes at Sam, who had no right to be so calm after he'd just _kissed_ him. He had no idea how his brother could look so wretched one minute, and yet completely own the moment the next, leaving Dean feeling as if he were grasping at straws amidst the sea of his brother's quiet determination. Anger simmered low in his gut. It was easier to be angry. "What's that even supposed to mean?"

"It means," Sam answered with exasperating patience as though he were explaining the phenomenon of ebb and flow to an overexcited four-year-old, "that you're not going to die and can allow yourself to experience whatever you want to."

"No!" Dean cried out, astonishing even himself with his vehemence. He gulped and held up a hand, when Sam made yet another attempt to get into his personal space. "I can't," he added more quietly. "You don't understand."

"I do," Sam tried to reassure him. He looked at him, doe-eyed. "It's mutual."

Dean snorted humorlessly. They'd been doing the dance pretty much for the last ten years. Dean might not be the sharpest tool in the shed, but he'd seen Sam look, had felt his gaze lingering on his shoulders, on his ass. He knew what it meant.

"No." He shook his head. It wasn't the fear of being alone with this unhealthy attraction that bothered him. "That's not it."

Sam's eyes and voice were soft enough to drown in. "Then what is it?"

Dean had to avert his gaze.

Horror and shame pulsed through him when he remembered that one moment where he'd seen his black eyes in the mirror; underneath all the confusion and terror a warm liquid emotion pooled low in his stomach, something Dean now recognized as _relief_.

"I – I feel things," Dean explained despite himself, before biting down on his lip with a silent curse. He hadn't wanted to say that. He hated how Sam could pry him open as easily as a box of cereal, greedily helping himself to the contents, the unwholesome feast of Dean's insecurities. He looked back at Sam, aiming for defiant and failing spectacularly. "I want things. That's – Sam, that's not me!"

Wanting more from life than driving down crazy street with Sam by his side, chasing evil and cutting its head off – what was that if not a lethal metastasis of the carefree life he'd led as a demon? For the very first time, Dean had felt like he could do whatever he wanted. It had been a glorious experience, addictive even. But Sam had taken that away from him, choosing his humanity over his happiness, and _fuck_, sometimes Dean wished he could hate his brother for it.

"Or maybe it is you, for the very first time," Sam countered gently, like an echo to Dean's thoughts.

Dean flinched. "Don't say that." He looked pleadingly at his brother. "Please, Sammy, don't you say that to me."

"You think this is the Mark?" Sam asked, eyes wide and shining with pity.

"I know it is!" Dean burst out as a fresh bout of anger ripped through him. "You want to know when I figured it out?" he asked, a cruel twist to his mouth. "It was when I was a demon. I thought: I just did the King of Hell, why not do my little brother next?"

Now it was Sam's turn to flinch. His eyes brimmed with subdued hurt, the way they always did whenever he was reminded of Dean's time with Crowley. "That's not true," he gritted out.

Dean wished he could take it back, but Sam's face was a map of all the times Dean had hurt him, what did one more blow matter?

"I met Crowley tonight," he said instead. A sick sort of pleasure curled in his stomach at the look of betrayal on Sam's face. "I was going to ask him to come back to the bunker with me –"

Dean halted involuntarily. He'd been tempted. He still didn't fully understand why he hadn't acted on the impulse.

Sam's hand landed on his shoulder, making him jump. He'd expected Sam to snap and storm off, but his brother seemed hellbent on defying all of his expectations today. He gave Dean's shoulder a gentle squeeze, and when he spoke next, the words were sincere. "Listen, does it even matter… Who cares when… I want you to be happy," he clarified at last, love and forgiveness in his voice stronger than steel, announcing more clearly than any threat or outburst of anger that this discussion wasn't over until Sam said it so.

It made Dean wonder, not for the first time, if he only ever won arguments with Sam because his brother let him. In this case, Sam would never let it go. After years of nagging him, _There's got to be something you want for yourself, Dean_, it was too big to pass over. The only way Dean could still gain the upper hand and put a stop to this conversation would be by holding a knife to Sam's throat and flashing black eyes at him. It wasn't a comforting thought.

Sam's hand squeezed his shoulder a second time. "I want to make you happy."

Dean shook him off and laughed harshly. "How exactly do you plan to do that? Throw me a couple of vamps to decapitate each morning for breakfast, and hope I don't slice your throat for dessert?"

Anger flared up in Sam's eyes. "You're such a dick sometimes!" he shouted and the next minute Dean's face exploded with white heat where Sam had punched him on his cheekbone.

Blinking away the tears blurring his eye, Dean hit right back, and although Sam had obviously anticipated the move, he couldn't fully block Dean's fist from crashing into his chest.

Then they were fighting.

The Mark on his arm began to sizzle, excited, voracious, finally getting the satisfaction Dean had denied it back at the bar. A pleasant hum spread through his body, soaking his muscles and skin in the warm, numbing thirst for blood, drowning out everything but the slide of their muscles and bones against each other, the sound of fists on skin.

He surged forward, shoving Sam in the chest, then backed away again, sidestepping the swing of Sam's left hand, only to have Sam's right hand collide hard with his eyebrow.

A minute later he had Sam in a headlock, and Sam's feet kicked into his calves, making him loose balance and trip over the edge of his bed.

The next moment arms, legs, fists were flying wildly as they both grappled for purchase, squirming, twisting, pushing, putting every figure of the complicated dance they'd practiced since the early days of their childhood into practice, Dad's lessons still ringing in their ears.

But there was a voice at the back of Dean's head growing steadily stronger, cutting through the sedating lull of muscle memory and the eager demands of the Mark, high and shrill and freaked-out, _Ohgodohgodohgod_._ I'm going to kill him._

He felt like he'd walked right into one of his nightmares. He wouldn't be able to stop.

However, Sam didn't stop either. No matter what Dean threw at him, Sam didn't budge, dealt out jabs and blows as good as he got.

Even before Sam won their brawl by hurling Dean forcefully against his dresser, something inside him began to sing jubilantly, because Sam could take him, Sam was strong, Sam could take him _out_.

For a moment Dean couldn't breathe. When the air slammed back into his lungs, he blinked away the blood trickling into his eyes and registered that one of the drawer pulls was digging painfully into his stomach while his forehead was throbbing with pain where it had been smashed into the mirror leaning on the dresser. Sam was pressed flush against him from behind, warm and soaked in sweat, leaving him no room to escape. And he was hard.

Distantly he noted the chafing slide of his jeans and boxers down his legs, the sound of Sam unbuckling his belt.

Panic seized him, intermingled with the bloodlust still thrumming inside. He jabbed an elbow back into Sam's kidney, but Sam barely winced and merely tightened his hold on Dean.

As Sam's teeth grazed the skin on his shoulder where his shirt had ripped during their fight, Dean twisted and squirmed in his brother's arms, terrified that Sam would ease up, terrified that given the chance he'd whirl around and rip his brother's throat out.

Then Sam was kissing him again, and for a while Dean lost track of everything but the worshipful touch of Sam's lips and the coaxing flicks of his tongue.

As soon as he'd regathered his wits, Dean bit down hard on Sam's lip. Sam retaliated with a sharp slap to Dean's windpipe that made him black out for a fraction of a second and gasp for breath, giving Sam the opportunity to stab his tongue possessively into Dean's open mouth.

"Do you still not get that we're going to do this, Dean?" he growled. "I'm going to take you apart, piece by piece, and then I'm going to put you back together, and you'll be whole again."

He sounded like he actually believed that. Through the fog enveloping his senses and clouding his mind, Dean thought he sounded insane. Not that it mattered. He'd already loved Sam long before anything resembling sense came out of his mouth.

"Sam," he whined against his brother's mouth, unsure what he wanted to say. Sam slowly licked over the inside of his bottom lip. "Sam," he moaned again.

"Just let go, I've got you, let go," Sam murmured. Part of Dean still felt certain that it wasn't Sam's place to say that, but he was dizzy and up suddenly seemed down and down seemed sideways, and every patch of his skin that Sam had touched was on fire.

One of Sam's fingers pushed into him, and Dean trembled against the fresh burn, while Sam hummed soothingly into his skin. It was slick and sticky, and the only part of Dean's brain that was still functioning supplied _slick with Sam's spit. _It made him want to exclaim, _Gross, dude_, because Sam should know better, Sam knew how fussy Dean was about hygiene – but then Sam twisted his finger deep inside him, toe-curling ecstasy ran through him and he arched up, chasing the sensation, losing all coherent thought, and no longer gave a damn.

"Let me, let me," Sam whispered urgently, and Dean could only groan helplessly in answer. How was that even a question? There was nothing he wouldn't let Sam do.

He abandoned himself to the ruthless ministrations of Sam's teeth on his shoulder and his fingers inside him. Making good of his promise, Sam was breaking down all his walls, even those Dean didn't know he had, opening up a burning hole at the bottom of his heart. For a moment, Dean teetered on the edge, scared and mesmerized. Then he let himself fall.

He felt himself plummet deeper and deeper, afraid of hitting the ground, knowing he'd shatter into a thousand pieces, and desiring the impact at the same time. His hands scuffed along the surface of the dresser, too sweaty to grip the polished wood, eventually latching themselves onto Sam's hips, dragging him closer; and then he came with a screechy whimper, like an insect that had been crushed and smeared carelessly across a wall.

Spent, Dean collapsed against his brother's chest and for the first time he actually caught sight of them in the mirror he'd collided with earlier.

The mirror had migrated into his room sometime after Sam had cured him, or rather, Dean had put it up there himself. There was already a grimy, opaque mirror above the sink next to the door, but when his nightmares chased him up from sleep, Dean found it safer to check twice that his eyes weren't blinking black back at him. Then, one night after waking up with gory visions of slaughter still hiding behind his eyes, Dean had punched his reflection. Sam bandaged his bloodied knuckles, his touch lighter than Dean deserved, and didn't say _But you told me you were better_. Afterwards Dean kept the mirror, broken as it was. It felt like a good warning.

From the impact of Dean's forehead hitting the cool glass panel, the mirror had cracked in yet another place, the previous y-shaped crack transformed into something that looked like the bony claws of a shtriga.

Each fraction of glass seemed to reflect a separate reality back at Dean, each image irreconcilable with the others, refusing to transcend the curse of individuation, refusing to form a coherent whole.

The first thing that caught his eye was a smattering of nose, forehead and sweaty hair in one of the largest slivers of glass on the left – Sam's face buried in his neck. Dean's skin was already starting to bruise purple, but Sam kept sucking and biting, interspersed with soft _Shhs_ every time a whine tumbled from Dean's lips. "I won't give up on you," Sam growled into his oversensitive skin, lapping the words away with the tip of his tongue, and a choked, desperate sound escaped Dean's lips. Or maybe Sam said, "I won't give you up." Dean couldn't be sure, not with Sam's teeth and cock being too goddamn distracting and Sam sounding so angry; fuck, Dean had completely forgotten how angry Sam could be. Sam had mostly managed to rein it in after Ruby, after Lucifer. He'd been doing so well. Now Dean was dragging him down with him. Again.

Then there was Sam's left hand playing with Dean's nipples, the pinches forceful rather than teasing, visible only as the meandering bulge underneath Dean's shirt.

The bottom of the mirror revealed Sam's other arm, slung protectively across Dean's waist.

The remaining splinters showed diffuse fragments of Dean's face.

Dean didn't recognize himself. His skin was drenched in sweat. Flushed. A gash disfigured his forehead, blood trickling over his nose, brow and temple in faint, already crusted rivulets. He felt the irrational impulse to lift his hand and check if the cut was already closing, if it was still there at all, even though the mirror clearly told him so; but his limbs were too heavy and refused to cooperate. His mouth, slack and panting, twisted into obscene shapes with every move Sam made inside him. But more than anything, it was the sight of his eyes that disturbed him – dark and blown, cracked wide, wide open.

There was no relief inside him this time, however shameful, only urgency and dread. Even with those blank, pitch-black demon eyes he'd felt more like himself than he did now, seeing a broken creature of naked, pathetic need stare back at him.

Before Dean could avert his gaze from his reflection, Sam glanced up from his shoulder and their eyes met in the mirror. The realization shook through Dean that Sam was truly everywhere, all around him, inside him, taking everything, seeing everything, and there was no place where Dean could hide from him, not in the damp folds of his shirt, not in the tiny furrow between his brows. Sam's eyes were blazing, wild and fearless, and maybe even reverent. Whatever Sam was looking at, it couldn't be Dean's monstrous reflection, and it sure as hell wasn't Dean.

Shuddering, Dean turned his face to the side, while Sam brushed his lips over the exposed skin of his throat, leaving a fresh trail of wet, openmouthed kisses, slowly travelling up to Dean's ear.

Dean clung more firmly to Sam's hips where he was pounding into him with an inhuman rhythm, digging his nails into Sam's flesh, because that was all he still had, all he could still do.

He'd seen Sam with Ruby once, accidentally. Had seen his brother claim and mark and use her without restraint, pushing and pulling her into whatever shape pleased him, as though she were no more powerful than a fly on the wall.

He recognized the beat.

Sam was holding nothing back now. Dean didn't know whether to feel cherished or condemned.

Hours might have passed or maybe only seconds, filled with heat and friction and a melee of pain and pleasure, when Sam finally came with a hoarse shout that reverberated in Dean's auricle. As he slumped over Dean, huge and boneless, he whispered a contented "Love you", like an echo, and pressed a soft kiss to his earlobe. As if it were really that simple.

A moment later Sam pulled out and stepped back. Dean stumbled, feeling strung-out and bereft, nothing left to hold him up now the solid plane of his brother's broad chest behind him had disappeared, and with his jeans and boxers still tangled around his ankles, he clumsily toppled down to the floor.

Sam should laugh, should make a joke.

But he didn't. Because that was Dean's job, right? He'd been cast as the clown of the family; he was the one supposed to crack a joke. Except he fucked that up just like everything else. All he could think of was _Banging monsters, again?_ The joke was on him this time, and it hurt.

There was the rustle of pants being zipped up, the clink of a belt being closed. _Sam's_, Dean's brain supplied a beat too late. Dean's were still twisted around his ankles. The sound roused Dean enough to try to rise to his feet, to pull up his jeans, but he couldn't move a single limb.

"Dean," Sam said somewhere above him. Oddly enough, Sam sounded _happy_.

Dean didn't know what to do with that piece of information. Except that it brought home to him how he _wasn't_.

Fuck, this was exactly why he didn't want to keep searching for a cure. Sam had shown him now that he could beat the Mark, he could beat anything, he was strong. But it was never about the Mark. It was never even about the sex or the whole love… and love. It was about Dean's stupid dreams, his ridiculous hopes for a life _after_. It was about wanting more from life. It was about wanting to play house with his brother, for fuck's sake. It was about wanting _everything_.

Everything he would never have.

A couple of punches and two orgasms, and all of Dean's inner wishes had cracked, just like that mirror. Sam had made his point, just not the one Dean wanted him to prove.

Sam crouched down in front of him. "Dean." He bracketed Dean's head in his hands and peered anxiously into his face. "You're bleeding, oh God, you're –" _crying_, he didn't say. "God, Dean, did I hurt you?"

Dean shook his head, not trusting himself to speak.

Sam brushed a thumb over his cheekbone with devastated devotion. "Dean." Sam's voice was small. "This – I – you did want this, right?"

Dean swallowed down the wave of nausea that rose up at the back of his throat, making him want to puke all over his brother's shoes and hurl something unforgivable at him, such as _Get out_.

It wasn't Sam's fault Dean was so screwed up inside.

It wasn't Sam's fault that despite everything Dean had still gotten his hopes up.

It wasn't Sam's fault that while every two-year-old only needed to come into contact with a hot stove once to learn not to touch it, Dean, stupid fuck that he was, kept coming back and burning himself.

"Yeah, Sammy." He winced at how paper-thin and raspy the words came out. He saw his brother's mouth twitch unhappily. Not enough. Again not enough. He swallowed and added, "Wouldn't use your toothbrush if I were you."

Sam let out a laugh that sounded more like a sob. The sound scraped over Dean's chest like a thousand glass shards, so he hastily swallowed it in another kiss.

It tasted bitter, something like regret.

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